Week 22: 1 April 2024 – “Jesus Christus unser Heiland”: Easter

Plus: Bach's 4 Chorale Collections, TAN gives us a "Hypertonic," The Pursuit of Musick, and more!

As always, we recognize that Bond Chapel is situated in the traditional homeland and native territory of the Three Fires Confederacy—the Potawatomi, Odawa, and Ojibwe Nations—as well as other groups including the Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Miami, Peoria, and Sac and Fox. We remember their forced removal and dispossession, but also remember to speak of these groups in the present tense, as Chicago continues to be resound with tens of thousands of Native voices. 

This week, I found myself circling around to Ojibwe singer/producer Joe Rainey’s 2022 album Niineta. I’m not sure I have anything to add beyond the (very positive) Pitchfork review and interview, but I’ll at least echo their assessment: you’ve never heard anything like this music. Basically the whole album is a layering of crunchy noise with shimmeringly beautiful synth harmonies; the cool part is how he integrates pow wow music into both halves of that equation. Sampled vocals can play either role; drums can be either rhythmic or atmospheric. It’s really fascinating music, and I’m glad it’s gotten some national exposure, even if only among the hipster set. Great Instagram handle too. 

Week 22: 1 April 2024 – “Jesus Christus unser Heiland”: Easter

Please save applause for the end of each set

Jesus Christus unser Heiland, BWV 665

Jesus Christus unser Heiland, BWV 666

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Christ lag in Todesbanden, BWV 695

Christ lag in Todesbanden, BWV 718

Jesus, meine Zuversicht, BWV 728

Jesus Christus unser Heiland, der von uns den Zorn Gottes wandt, BWV 688

Jesus Christus unser Heiland, BWV 689

Ach bleib bei uns, Herr Jesu Christ, BWV 649

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Christ lag in Todesbanden, BWV 625

Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 626

Christ ist erstanden, BWV 627

Erstanden ist der heil'ge Christ, BWV 628

Erschienen ist der herrliche Tag, BWV 629

Heut’ triumphieret Gottes Sohn, BWV 630

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“Jesus Christus unser Heiland, der von uns den Zorn Gottes wandt” is actually a Maundy Thursday hymn, so we’re going a bit out of order. I just thought that the music Bach wrote for this tune (and there is a lot of it) worked a bit better with Easter pieces than Passiontide. Partly, I think that’s due to the character of the “Jesus Christus unser Heiland” tune, which, like so many of Luther’s chorale tunes, was adapted from a plainchant melody. As we’ll see, that “old-fashioned” sound is a key feature of Bach’s easter music too.

Well, really “Jesus Christus unser Heiland” is more generally a communion hymn, a fact Bach even marks on the score of BWV 665. And maybe it’s possible to hear some of that character in BWV 665 itself, a majestic and solid piece that unusually gives the tune in longish notes to each voice in turn. The harmony gets incredibly crunchy in the third line, and the figuration blossoms forth for the last.

I once heard a story from a French organist—I think it was Thomas Lacôte, but it could have been Thomas Ospital—about Messiaen playing BWV 665. Messiaen, they said, choose the piece as a closing voluntary, and played it as slowly as you could possibly imagine. (“Le banquet celeste” but make it Bach.) Completely legato and rhythmically uninflected, they said it lasted nigh-on twenty minutes. At a certain point, the standard way of listening to music completely broke down and the piece turned into a tonal kaleidoscope. The best Bach performance they’d ever heard.

I can’t promise to play BWV 665 anything like that, but I do think it’s uniquely suitable to such a performance. (Just like not every pop song could be as dramatically improved as Enya’s “Only Time” by being played 1000% slower.) This is such an incredibly dense piece, built on striking melodic twists and subtle interlocking of the parts, that slowing it down finally gives an opportunity to actually internalize what’s happening moment to moment. I just hope Messiaen didn’t use a plenum like I am—think of the poor listeners’ ears!

In some ways, BWV 666 is a very natural partner to BWV 665: the piece also gradually speeds up, going line by line, with different accompanying figuration for each line. And it’s also a great contrast, withholding the pedal until the end to give a lighter texture, and maintaining jig rhythms throughout. No Messiaen treatment for this piece, please.

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Two takes on the Easter hymn “Christ lag,” or really three: BWV 695 ends with a setting of the hymn written with figured bass. What you get before that is a short dance version of the hymn, with the tune in the middle of the texture. What you get after (in this recital) is something else entirely.

The BWV 718 “Christ lag” is unique among Bach’s chorale preludes, but in another sense quite familiar: it’s basically in the style of a chorale partita. Think of a piece that combines the first and last variations of Ach, was soll ich Sünder machen. So you start with a “violin and cello” duo,” followed by a series of little sections, full of echoes and interludes, that present a variety of musical approaches to the tune. The whole thing gradually speeds up (there’s an “Allegro” in the middle of the score, plus a move after that through triplets to sixteenths). It may last only five minutes, but this piece has more musical variety than almost any of Bach’s other organ works.

“Jesus, meine Zuversicht” is very pretty and I have nothing to say about it. Unfortunately, this week I can’t hide that by sneaking it into discussion of another piece.

The Clavierübung III “Jesus Christus unser Heiland” settings are decidedly not pretty (how’s that for a transition?). Much the opposite: as befits the melody, they are both purposefully angular, awkward, weird, and even ugly. The pedaliter setting BWV 688 is notorious among organists for its leaps, oddly contorted runs, bizarre syncopations, and general difficulty:

The standard line about this piece is: “don’t make it sound like an exercise!” Of course I agree, but the implied “don’t play it fast” is surely missing the point. This piece is confusing and vertiginous; a quicker tempo both heightens that sense and ameliorates it, by making the tune easier to follow and emphasizing the rhythmic continuity.

BWV 689 is a straight fugue on the same chorale, although using the sharp fourth that Bach’s other settings iron out:

The result is harmonically a bit confusing, and Bach really leans into that: I find this piece pretty unsettling to listen to, with the sense of key never quite stable, and the melody always a little bit uncomfortable. There are some cool contrapuntal devices (can you hear when the tune is played twice as slowly near the end?), but it’s a pretty severe, ungenerous piece. And this one doesn’t even have crazy syncopations.

After that, “Ach bleib bei uns” should be a massive breath of fresh air. In a rare change of pace, this is a piece for exactly our occasion: it’s from an Easter Monday cantata (BWV 6). And boy can you hear that it’s a cantata movement. The “left hand” part (I play a lot of it with the right, but you don’t need to tell anybody that) was originally for violoncello piccolo (the instrument that the sixth cello suite was written for?), and really does sound like it: there are lots of quick string crossings, often resulting in serious leaps for the organist. After a whole Lenten season depriving ourselves (mostly) of “chamber music,” it’s possible to get some sense of how joyous this aria must have been to hear in context.

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To close, the Orgelbüchlein chorales for Easter. It’s a little funny to play them in order like this, since there’s an obvious centerpiece: “Christ ist erstanden” (don’t really need to speak German to get the idea) was the only entry in the Orgelbüchlein to be planned out with a three-verse structure. It’s understandable: each verse has a different tune (!), so any one-verse setting would be incomplete. And this structure lets Bach change things up a bit: there’s a gradual progression to more and more continuously flowing sixteenth notes as the verses progress. A cohesive but varied piece, at an unusually big scale for the collection.

What’s not unusual about “Christ ist erstanden” is the format of each verse. Say it with me again: tune on the top, imitative figuration below. And the same is true of all the other Easter chorales but one. Instead, the variety comes from the nature of the figuration and overall mood of the pieces: “Christ lag” is solemn and square; “Jesus Christus unser Heiland” (different tune and text!) is a slow jig; “Erstanden ist” is a quick and joyful carol;¹ and “Heut triumphieret” is…well, I don’t know how to give that piece a short and snappy description, but it’s a 3/2 chorale with a cool minor/major thing going on and an exceptionally busy pedal part.

OK, I left one out—and said “all but one.” “Erschienen ist” isn’t a huge departure from other Orgelbüchlein chorales you’ve heard in previous weeks: it’s another chorale sandwich, where the tune is the bread. But it is an exceptionally fun piece, combining the carol-like rhythms of “Erstanden ist” with the folk-like harmonies of “Heut triumphieret,” all along with a snappy (and extremely difficult to execute in sixths) rhythm in the left hand. Listen to it here:

Not every canon has to be a forbidding, “intellectual” counterpoint exercise. Sometimes they’re just rounds, pure musical fun. Happy Easter.

The “Big Four” Collections, or: 100 Things You Can Do With a Chorale

OK, it’s a bit less than 100—there are 91 chorales in these sets. But you get the idea.

Which sets? Well, as far as I can tell, this is the only recital in the series to include at least one chorale each from the Orgelbüchlein, the Schübler chorales, the third volume of the Clavierübung, and the Leipzig Chorales aka “The Great Eighteen.” (For good measure, it includes one from the “Kirnberger” collection, and—interestingly—nothing from the Neumeister collection.) That’s partly an artifact of increased odds: only two other concerts (Christmas and…why don’t you take a guess?) are “all chorales all the time.” But even Christmas left things out; the only reason the Clavierübung III and the “Great Eighteen” are appearing today is because I decided Maundy Thursday (and/or Communion) was close enough for Easter.

In any case, this juxtaposition probably represents the best opportunity to contrast the four collections. Some of that I’ve done implicitly throughout the notes (including today), but hopefully it’ll be useful to see it in one place. 

Start with liturgical intent. It’s revealing that only two of the collections were clearly structured in this way. The Orgelbüchlein gives more or less a synoptic overview of the entire church calendar, or rather was planned to do that; the 46 chorales that survive are about a third of what was laid out in the manuscript. (It’s actually right after Easter that Bach seems to have lost interest, as will become clear over the next few weeks.) Meanwhile, the Clavierübung III gives what’s sometimes been called the “German Organ Mass,” the chorales with ordinary liturgical functions (Kyrie, Gloria, Creed, communion, baptism, catechism). I’ve slotted them in for occasions that make sense—and when Bach used those chorales for cantatas—but they could really come any time.

That’s quite different from the plan of the Schübler Chorales—a set of six miscellaneous Bach cantata arias that may or may not have been arranged and/or assembled by Bach himself—and the “Great Eighteen,” which come from a manuscript that consists of fifteen chorales copied by Bach, two more by a student, and another by a different student with the Vom Himmel hoch variations sandwiched in between. (For good measure, the six trio sonatas open the manuscript—it’s a hell of an anthology.) These, too, don’t seem to fit any liturgical plan.

Partly as a result of their different geneses, there are major musical differences between these four collections. Easiest to describe are the Schübler Chorales, which are all in some kind of chamber style, and mostly for one solo instrumental line, one solo voice, and bass. Trio textures aren’t super unusual in Bach’s chorales, but that particular disposition very much is, so these pieces tend to stick out like a sore thumb. The arrangements are not very forgiving, and there is very little sense of compromise for the organist’s comfort. Rather than exemplifying Bach’s chorale preludes, the Schübler collection is more of a provocation: why don’t we try arranging more cantata arias like this?

The Clavierübung III, on the other hand, was definitely planned for publication by Bach, and it shows. In more ways than one: not only are these very ambitious and showy pieces (both technically virtuosic and musically extremely intricate), but they are also interspersed with what has to be filler. The four Duets were added last, and the little manualiter chorales (like BWV 689) also seem to have been added later. Was Bach just trying to fill up space to fit the right number of pages? (Some of the manualiter chorales seem so perfunctory that I can’t imagine any other reason.) In any case, this is very “public” music, and the public face Bach liked to show could be pretty ungracious.

The Leipzig Chorales are also huge pieces—BWV 652 can take around ten minutes—but significantly more approachable. Even the more fearsome among them—like this week’s “Jesus Christus unser Heiland”—work their dissonances out more normally than the Clavierübung III chorales, and others (like “O Lamm Gottes”) are clearly designed to be as beautiful and moving as humanly possible. This is the collection of hits like “Schmücke dich” and “An Wasserflüssen Babylon.” Even the weirdest of these chorales—the second “Nun Komm” setting—is very purposefully sandwiched between two much more approachable versions of the same tune.

As the diminutive -lein in the Orgelbüchlein’s title indicates, those are small-scale settings, basically heavily ornamented versions of the hymn that do a once-over on the tune and then call it quits. None of them have an introduction or coda longer than a couple notes, nor do they have interludes. There’s only one chorale with a duplicate setting (we’ll hear a lot of different versions of it in a couple weeks). It’s hard to avoid the impression that Bach selected and composed these pieces with a certain degree of uniformity in mind: as I’ve emphasized in my notes, they can be structurally very samey, and they’re all about the same length on the page.

I’ve mentioned this before, but there’s a convenient way to contrast the Orgelbüchlein and “Great Eighteen” in particular: BWV 631 (from the former) was expanded massively to form BWV 667 (from the latter). The “Great Eighteen” version adds a four-measure interlude, a long coda, and a second verse of the tune in the pedals. And a similar process of expansion seems to have occurred with some of the other chorales: “Komm Heiliger Geist” BWV 651 survives in an earlier version that’s less than half as long. The later version basically just repeats things to fill out the length (and complete the tune). It’s by no means a bad effect, but it shows two very different sets of musical priorities: one is to efficiently present the tune, and the other is to luxuriate in it.

That pretty much sums up the difference between Bach’s two primary modes of writing chorale settings for organ: loosely, you could call the Orgelbüchlein one “chorale preludes” (ornamented hymn verses) and the “Great Eighteen”/Clavierübung III one “chorale fantasies” (interludes, codas, multiple verses, grander scale). But even that hides the sheer variety possible within these collections. Think of the three “Nun komm” settings: slow ornamented melody, quick trio, and blazing plenum fugue. The Orgelbüchlein format might not admit that kind of variety, but as this week’s chorales show, it constantly shifts from piece to piece in terms of figuration, time signature, mode, and overall sound.

It’s striking that the Orgelbüchlein does so given that there’s no obvious need to: the Clavierübung’s pairs (and one trio) of chorales on the same tune are clearly amenable to pedaliter/manualiter alternation, and the “Great Eighteen” seem to have been compiled to show strongly contrasting approaches for several tunes. (BWV 651 and BWV 652, if you’ll believe it, are settings of the same “Komm Heiliger Geist.”) But even without this particular reason to avoid repetition, Bach tends to change things up regardless. They may not all be as distinctive as BWV 718’s “Christ lag,” but they all show something unique. The chorales Bach included in his collections are just different.

What I’m Listening To

Lucas Debargue – Fauré: Complete Music for Solo Piano

Fauré has to be the most underplayed of the “brand-name” composers in the piano repertoire. I’ll interrupt myself right there to make the obvious point that it’s impossible to say who’s most “underplayed” overall, not when there are excellent composers like Joshua Uzoigwe who have practically no recital or recording footprint at all internationally; at least Margaret Bonds, Nathaniel Dett, Lili Boulanger, and Fanny Hensel (to name a few other candidates) are starting to make some inroads, if far too slowly. (They may even be—belatedly—on the path to becoming “brand-names” themselves.) So, by comparison, it’s hard to weep for Fauré, who has gotten multiple good complete recordings by major painists, in addition to large selections from others. 

Still, those recordings hardly match up to the quality and importance of this music. Yes, importance: to take just one of his legacies, consider that Fauré’s version of the fin de siècle French musical language was the compositional influence on Nadia Boulanger. That gives him an incredibly long shadow on twentieth-century music. After all, once you start listening in that light, you might start hearing how Aaron Copland had such an affinity for his style—and the traces of that sound among Copland’s many imitators in film music alone are good enough evidence for how widespread Fauré’s influence has been.

It’s also just really wonderful piano music. But, as I said, I don’t think the existing recordings really help it out. Collard, Crossley, Hamelin, and Stott are wonderful pianists and very fluent (native in some cases) speakers of “French” style; but in the case of their Fauré, I mostly hear the kind of “Frenchness” that can sound a bit like a trivialization of the music. Beautiful soft touch; glittering quick notes; nothing too overdramatic (Russians) or “thick” (Germans). At its best (Stott), it’s very pretty indeed; at its worst (Collard), it sounds almost mechanically literal.²

Thank goodness for Debargue’s recording. The biggest difference comes in the “liting” pieces, the Barcarolles and Valse-Caprices. (I may as well say that I think these are by far Fauré’s best piano works, and that I’ve never quite understood some of the hype around the Nocturnes.) Debargue finally gives some sense of rhythmic vitality to these pieces. The first barcarolle (above) finally manages to stop sounding like an etude (it is tough to distribute the melody between the thumbs of the two hands); the fourth finally (mostly) avoids sounding like unflavored Pixy Sticks; and the last two keep the swing feel while preserving the deliciously icy, modernist sound that more “literal” recordings (Crossley in particular) have already able to draw out of them.

The other main joy of this recording is its sequencing. Sure, now that most of us consume most recorded music digitally, it’s just a matter of making a new playlist to arrange a composer’s output chronologically. Still, I somehow suspect that most of us don’t do that; even for an album of 68 songs like this (and one where you just need to follow opus numbers to get the order), that’s quite time-consuming and annoying, for an uncertain payoff. But Debargue shows how illuminating a chronological listen can be. Not only does it avert the weariness that thirteen barcarolles or nocturnes in a row can induce (how much 6/8 can your ears take?); it also really points up Fauré’s stylistic evolution, which is as complex and fascinating as any composer’s. Getting the fourth Valse-Caprice, sixth Nocturne, and fifth Barcarolle all in a row goes a long way toward highlighting how Fauré was searching after high drama in that post-La bonne chanson era. And hearing all the late piano music together—no skipping the fifth Impromptu and the truly underplayed Nine Preludes on your way from Nocturne No.10 to No.11—is really an extraordinary journey, the sound of a composer born during Chopin’s lifetime coming to terms with Debussy, Ravel, and Stravinsky. Not every “complete works” box really rewards an equally complete listen (certainly, despite the best efforts of Latry and Alard, there’s no good way to make a complete Bach organ works set function as anything but a reference), but this recording really does. Hopefully Debargue’s example can push others to try this music on. Unless they’re already busy learning Uzoigwe and Bonds; we can only hope.

Pamela Badjogo – YIÊH

Better late than never, I guess. I’m about a month behind on this album, but I’ve been jamming to it pretty consistently this week. This is one of those rare records that actually makes good on the cliché “compulsively danceable.” Sometimes that danceability is kept at a simmer, as in the title track, where the vocals carry the energy and the beat sits back in a midtempo groove. But tracks like “LETONDO” really flip a switch; I won’t spoil the surprise, but see how that song grows to an eventual knockout blow. 

There’s some danger of getting samey in an album as sonically and rhythmically consistent as this one. Part of how Badjogo avoids that is by letting a fair variety of African pop influences shape the music. That’s partly obvious in the tracklist: features from French multimedia artist Aurélie Raidron, Ghanaian highlife singer Pat Thomas, and South African pop and gospel star Kelly Khumalo. But the production credits are even more telling: about half of the album was done with Aron Ottignon (arranger/pianist on “papaoutai”) and the other half with Kwame Yeboah (producer for Kojo Antwi). (I have to say that I prefer Yeboah’s half, the first six or so songs.) As you might expect, both mix in a range of pop and R&B influences, such that this is one of those rare records where it’s OK to name either “Afrobeat” or “Afrobeats” as a main stylistic thread. So there are highlife-esque guitars on “Dans mon agenda” and “Mama mê” atmospheric synths and samples on “Polyphonies” and a sweet acoustic guitar (and bowed bass) backing to close out on “Petites femmes.” It’s all very nice stuff; now to explore her previous few albums…

Rosali – Bite Down

No, not her. I know, I had to do a double-take too. (I’m sure Rosali is sick of hearing this by now; I somehow doubt that ROSALÍA’s experienced it from the other direction.)

To my dismay, I think this marks my third week in a row of highlighting Stereogum’s Album of the Week. Here I was, patting myself on the back for getting into this folk-rock/Americana album instead of this week’s much more hyped (and also excellent!) releases from Waxahatchee and Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker; instead, I turn out to be as predictable as ever. I guess if you end up liking these recommendations, you should probably consider reading Stereogum—they publish actual reviews of this stuff. (That’s if you weren’t already following the essential writing of Tom Breihan there.)³

In any case, my preferences here could partly be an issue of genre; it might not be entirely fair to stick Lenker and Waxahatchee in the same category as Rosali. This really is a rock album, in the sense that just about every track on it has infinitely more of a pulse than any of Bright Future’s songs. The lyrics may not be quite as personal, original, or—let’s be real—interesting as Waxahatchee, but my god the sound is incredible. The whole album is a showcase of subtly variegated lead guitar sounds (“Slow Pain” is a standout among standouts), melodic (“Hopeless”), tastefully balanced drumming (coming to the fore in “Bite Down”), rocking piano (“My Kind”), and meditative organ (“May It Be On Offer”). Her singing is pretty great too. Three very worthwhile albums, but I know which one I’ll be coming back to.

In Memoriam: Péter Eötvös and Maurizio Pollini

To continue with the vaguely hipster pose, I guess that I always tended to prefer less-famous aspects of these two’s musicianship. Definitely Eötvös, who seems to be in the process of being remembered as an opera composer; I haven’t seen any of the shows live, and maybe that makes the difference, but I’d much rather listen to the violin concerto Seven, the fantastic trumpet showcase Jet Stream, or (of course?) the Toccata and Fugue in D Minor-inspired Multiversum. Actually, I’d most of all like to listen to his recordings as a conductor: a benchmark Berio Sinfonia, wonderful accounts of music by his countrymen, and about a gazillion other crucial new-music recordings.

New music might also be the most impressive facet of Pollini’s output. Pollini gets a weirdly bad rap for his Romantic music—I wish most players could give as much fire and sheer power to their Schumann and, yes, Chopin as he did early on—but I do think it’s fair to say that those aren’t his most essential recordings. Even just among active pianists in their primes, we have Grimaud for Schumann, Blechacz for Chopin, and Pratt for late Beethoven. But there is nobody who can play the Boulez Second Sonata like Pollini. Partly because so few pianists have the technique (Yuja Wang is starting to play Boulez now), and those that do aren’t the kind of pianist I would ever want to hear play Schumann or Chopin at all. Pollini’s complete Schoenberg sounds like somebody who just gets it, not only the “intellectual rigors” or whatever of the music, but also its post-Brahmsian languor. His Nono is spectacular (the piece was written for him). Like everyone else, I’ll absolutely keep Pollini’s first Chopin concerto in my rotation; but I bet that the twentieth-century music recordings will be what lasts. It’s hard to imagine ever topping them.

TAN – TAN W SERIES ‘3TAN’(WORLD Ver.) 1ST ALBUM⁴

Candy Shop – “Good Girl”

Another study in contrasts this week, but this time between new releases. Really, the contrast might be almost too obvious. Forget about boy group versus girl group (although it’s hard to imagine gender-swapped versions of either song being released); the differences in the musical approaches of these two songs say an awful lot about the current musical environment.

Start with TAN, and let me be absurdly crotchety for a moment: “HYPERTONIC” is what I believe we used to call a “pop song.” The beat is just great, with the best buzzsaw synths I’ve heard since “Spicy” coupled to feel-them-in-your-chest beats and absolutely locked-in guitar and keyboard licks. There’s decent sonic variety, but the breaks don’t let go of the rhythmic thread, instead just cutting back a bit on the density and volume to let the song grow again; the rap break (not bad, and definitely not as cringe as such things can be in K-pop) actually pumps things up a bit, allowing for a really climactic build to the final chorus. The tunes aren’t the absolute best in the world, but they’re decently memorable, and the main hooks—“Hype-hypertoooonic”—are definitely addictive. I love the surprise (“hyper”) at the end of the chorus. I love the harmonies and layered vocals. Maybe this song sounds too busy to you. Sue me—I like busy.

The rest of the album isn’t half bad either. There’s nothing quite as sticky—they chose the right single—but everything sounds great and there’s lots to like about most of the other songs. The other ALLCAPS songs (“ADRENALINE,” “AREA”) live up to their FORMATTING, and they’re not the only tracks that groove along; I liked the funky backings on “Surfin’” the rock blast of “Tmi,” and the pulsing synthpop of “Love is an open door,” although the topline writing in all three is a bit weak. “Dreamy Love” is pretty close to a single-worthy pop-rock song. Even the ballads are well above average. 

None of that really seems to matter. The view and stream counts you’re seeing aren’t a mistake: TAN just doesn’t attract a big audience. Reportedly, this will be their final album, even though the group is barely over two years old. Maybe that’s not true, but it is incredibly hard to make it as a group that’s both not really charting and hasn’t been able to crack 30,000 sales with any of their albums. TAN’s label has probably lost millions trying to promote them. That’s not a knock on the group or label per se; even with talented and good-looking members, there’s nothing like a guarantee that a small-label group will reach even the limited success of an OnlyOneOf or (post-reality show) VANNER, no matter how good their music is. For every H1-KEY that broke through on the strength of great songs, there’s a SPEED who gave up after a couple years. (And SPEED had hitmaking labelmates Davichi and T-ARA to cross-promote with.) You just have to get lucky.

Still, it might not be a coincidence that “HYPERTONIC,” like Tan’s previous single “HEARTBEAT,” is a Shinsadong Tiger joint, possibly his last song to be released. (It’s a cut above “Diamond.”) I have to admit that the song sounds like a bit of a relic. Not in the sense that it sounds “dated”; there’s not a ton of distance between this song and, say, “Standing Next to You,” especially if you swap out some of TAN’s rhythmic punch for Jungkook’s harmonic depth. Rather, it’s just not fashionable to release songs this consistently energetic, songs that press these buttons. 

It’s not like there aren’t in-your-face songs anymore. Consider this week’s biggest boy group release: NCT DREAM’s “Smoothie,” a song that I actually kind of like (and which really doesn’t deserve the hate NCTzens are throwing at it). “Smoothie” isn’t afraid to get loud, to the point of occasionally getting a bit shout-y. But it is afraid to keep the energy up for more than a few seconds at a time. Not only is the chorus practically whispered (and lots of the song is actually whispered), but it’s followed by multiple practically empty bars. It’s sort of like “Hot Sauce” on dramamine, with the instrumental hooks sucked out to boot. “HYPERTONIC” is worlds away.

It’s even farther away from Candy Shop’s “Good Girl,” which has to be the blandest debut song I’ve ever heard. Forget about the cringey music video and lyrics, or even the weird “zoom” sound effects at 1:03 (and the fireworks effects that sound like your speakers are blowing out). Those are just distractions from the fact that this song has only the barest semblance of a hook, nothing in the way of tunes or fun chords (the bridge’s harmonies are interesting but not really engaging for me), and a beat that barely gets going until the end of the song. (À la BABYMONSTER, perhaps?)

I wasn’t at all excited by this week’s debuts from UNIS or ILLIT either, but I’m not mad about them;⁵ I wouldn’t have much reason to get exercised about “Good Girl” if it weren’t for who’s behind it. Candy Shop’s label head, Brave Brothers, is a producer with about as long of a track record as Shinsadong Tiger, albeit a more checkered portfolio of results. So, to harp on a theme from previous weeks, another very musically capable producer is just absolutely kneecapping himself to fit the trendy sound. 

Trendy it it certainly is: the washed-out sound of “Good Girl” is a perfect match for UNIS’s and ILLIT’s songs. Almost too good of a match—that’s part of why I don’t like all three songs. All of them inhabit the same post-trap, post-Jersey club, “R&B with no tunes” PinkPantheress-lite sonic universe that’s dominated K-pop since the debuts of LE SSERAFIM and NewJeans. But at least LE SSERAFIM had that bass lick, that rise in the prechorus, and that hook in the chorus. (No comment on NewJeans.)

Contrast that with—forget about “HYPERTONIC” for a moment—the songs that have given Brave Brothers such cachet. Most famously, he’s responsible for ultra high-energy, synth heavy dance bangers:

—not to mention his hits for UKISS and Dalshabet. But an almost equal number of his big songs have been slinky mid- or downtempo groovers, no synths needed:

That’s a lot to choose from, but to me, these two sides are best represented by another natural pair, Brave Brothers’ twin masterpieces for AOA (yes, “Miniskirt” and “Short Hair” are good too):

“Heart Attack” really lives up to the name, with that instantly catchy chorus hook perfectly linked up to relentless syncopated synth and piano hits. The tunes in the verses and prechorus aren’t quite as good, but with those hooks and backings (that synth part from around 2:15 in the video!), and with such a murderously good chorus, it hardly matters. (It’s a good sign when the instrumental break is almost as fun as the rest of the song.) It’s not hard to understand how GALACTIKA might have learned their tricks of the trade from working with this version of Brave Brothers.

The instrumentals carry a song like “Like a Cat” even harder, although you might have a better chance of whistling its tunes afterward. The chorus is definitely catchy (doubly so for the post-chorus “la-la-las,” and triply for Jimin’s inimitable “I’m good, I’m hot, I’m fresh, I’m fly”), but if you’re like me, you’re just as likely to want to sing that great keyboard countermelody in the chorus, or the strangely feline-sounding horn bend that punctuates its first line. There’s definitely a lot going on in “Like a Cat,” but it doesn’t need to be nearly as brash as “Heart Attack” to make its point.

Really, even reducing his output to these two “song types” is overly pigeonholing Brave Brothers. He’s also responsible for his share of blah R&B, for instance. And with his previous girl group, Brave Girls (even “Candy Shop” is an improvement on that bit of naming narcissism), he showed his ability to adapt to trends and still be musically successful:

Actually, I prefer his later songs in this “tropical” mode: “Chi Mat Baram” is a great song, even if the sound was a bit less trendy by then. And that song is from 2021, along with the fantastic “After We Ride.” I don’t think Brave Brothers is out of touch, and I don’t really think he’s lost much off his fastball either.

Rather, I just think the whole enterprise of the “Good Girl” style is antithetical to what makes other Brave Brothers songs work. I’m not saying it’s impossible to make good songs in this vein; PinkPantheress, LE SSERAFIM, and even NewJeans have them. But translating one kind of songwriting to the other seems like an awfully tall order. It’s probably not a good idea to wish that Brave Brothers would stick to his guns at all costs; clearly that wasn’t good for Shinsadong Tiger, either commercially or personally. Hopefully there’s some middle ground possible; Brave Brothers might be able to draw more on his own songwriting sensibilities after a couple tries, after getting comfortable with the new sound. If it hasn’t gone out of fashion by then.

Still, putting “HYPERTONIC” and “Good Girl” side by side, it’s hard not hold out for more of the kind of music TAN is putting out. Bring back the style of those AOA hits; bring back BraveSound.

Also liked…

Kjetil Mulelid – Agoja

Kim Sunggyu and Nam Woohyun – “Beautiful”

Fanie Antonelou and Sofya Gandilyan – Goethe Lieder (by Beethoven, Zelter, Reichardt, and Mozart)

Las Lloronas – Out of the Blue

Tiken Jah Fakoly – Acoustic

Ona K – Full, New, Luna

cwar – Balisong

What I’m Reading

Even a bad review can be useful. Last December, the London Review of Books published what has to be one of the worst book reviews I’ve ever read. But without it, I wouldn’t have even known that Andrew Parrott had come out with The Pursuit of Musick. Now that I’ve finally got my hands on it and read it, I can confirm that the review is even worse than I thought—and the book has a lot to recommend it.

How could I know that the review was trash before even seeing the book? Well, take a look for yourself: you’ll find that in it, Peter Phillips (of Tallis Scholars fame) spends a huge part of the article venting his personal and professional grievances with Parrott—and basically no time at all talking about the book under review. This would be bad enough, but it doesn’t help that Phillips is on the wrong side of practically every argument he rehashes. He’s probably annoyed that Parrott has laid out the evidence for the other side so well.

Phillips is, after all, not really a “historically informed” performer: he basically runs an orthodox twentieth-century-style English choir (with women) and has them sing a bunch of 16th century music. There’s nothing wrong with that on its face (and Phillips is very far from alone), even if it does typically result in somewhat square phrasing, sluggish tempi, and questionable decisions surrounding musica ficta. Tallis Scholar recordings are always very pretty, and for a lot of pieces, Phillips’ approach makes for a very musical result. I thought about recommending their recent Sheppard recording.

But, again, there’s not much “historical” in it. Parrott, by contrast, has always been willing to do historical experiments with sound. Sometimes that involves defending somewhat eccentric positions, including ones I wouldn’t necessarily agree with. (Start with the pitch level of his Machaut mass recording, if you can even find it.) So, even within the universe of historical performance, Parrott’s recordings can be shocking and thought-provoking, on top of being very fine. Not my favorite B-minor mass, but probably the recording that made me rethink the piece most.

OK, so far I’ve done exactly what Phillips did, which is to say nothing at all about the book. The Pursuit of Musick is a unique book, attempting to do several things at once. First is to present something like a documentary history of Western European music from around 1200 to around 1770. There are other anthologies of musical documents in English: Strunk’s Source Readings in Music History is still an essential compilation of more-or-less complete texts, including quite technical ones; the Cambridge Readings in the Literature of Music series, though chronologically incomplete, similarly gives excellent translations of a variety of important treatises; and for the eighteenth century, there’s Enrico Fubini and Bonnie Blackburn’s wonderful collection of documents. 

None of those would really do as history books by themselves. Closest to Parrott would be the Weiss/Taruskin Music in the Western World: A History in Documents (first edition from before Taruskin’s own Oxford History). Both books attempt to give a historical survey with most of the legwork done by primary sources. And a lot of the documents (the “greatest hits”) are the same.

Still, the differences are pretty obvious, even if you account for Parrott’s shorter timeframe. Weiss/Taruskin is chronological, like Taruskin’s Oxford History and most old-fashioned histories. Parrott’s book is topical, like most academic histories. Taruskin/Weiss give much longer excerpts; Parrott rarely gives more than a paragraph or two at a time. Parrott’s book is lavishly illustrated in color, self-published (for more control over the layout?), and designed to be as beautiful as possible (all those ligatures!); Weiss/Taruskin has relatively few plates (in black and white), and is published in more standard “textbook” format. The Pursuit of Musick, Phillips correctly points out, is basically a coffee-table book.

I think it probably works well as such; even if the topical organization is “academic,” it also lends itself to browsing, which is also aided by the length of the excerpts. There probably aren’t many people who are going to read this book cover to cover like I did, and that’s just fine. If you do, you might notice a couple repeated excerpts, but nothing too bad. It’s an understandable casualty of sorting by topic.

Then again, sorting by topic is quite fraught, and if you’re using this book for anything more than perusing, I imagine it might be a bit frustrating. Several topics appear more than once (say, tuning or basso continuo “in theory” and “in practice,” or in sections about instrument-builders and the instruments themselves), and it’s often a mystery to me why a given excerpt went where it did. The material is great, so it’s hardly painful to read more than you intended to, but this book isn’t really a quick reference.

That’s a bit of a shame, since (as Phillips identified‚ and felt called out by) The Pursuit of Musick is very clearly aimed at performers. There’s a huge wealth of material on performance practice here, most of which is probably familiar in the abstract to people trained in historical performance, but perhaps never tied to specific sources. As a result, Parrott can help link a given practice or its description to a specific time and place. And the material that’s not directly relevant to performance all helps build a vivid portrait of the soundworld of Western music surrounding the composition of the repertoire we play now.

Really, if I have a major criticism of this book, that’s it: it’s seems very tied to the “standard” repertoire that’s performed now, to the exclusion of a more well-rounded portrait of what kind of music was going on in Western Europe during those centuries. Every remotely well-known anecdote about Josquin is included, along with a very large number of the most famous Bach and Handel sources. That’s good for performers of those composers—I live in a glass house and I am not throwing stones—and the book does subtly emphasize the role of women as composers, performers, listeners, patrons, and thinkers. But, beyond a few descriptions of peasant music-making, it doesn’t really go beyond the music that people like Parrott would record. I counted a single (functionally “pre”-historic) source on Islamicate music in Spain, and I don’t think there was a single excerpt about Jewish or Roma or Turkish music. The section on New World and other global musical encounters (including with the former Warsaw Pact) is pretty perfunctory. Given, for instance, how often this book quotes from Rousseau—as interested as anybody in Chinese music—that’s a glaring omission. 

I have other quibbles—the bibliography is very inconsistent about giving modern translations, and never ever cites the secondary sources that have convinced people why they should care about some of these texts. (To be fair, Parrott has done a whole lot of digging and translating himself, so there’s a large chunk of material here that has no such source.) There’s a noticeable bias toward English sources (classic), and also toward sources that had historical translations into English. Some of the translations seem a bit tendentious, although Parrott is excellent about giving originals wherever key terms are uncertain.

Still: this is a beautiful, thoroughly enjoyable, and deeply informative book. (Even if I strained my neck carrying it around.) The appendices alone—basically a glossary and a historical gallery of composers, but with the text taken entirely from historical dictionaries and other sources—would be worth getting the book for. Basically everybody who performs or thinks about Western European music from these centuries should try to find a copy. Thanks, Peter Phillips.

A few others: 

• NY Times – The Team Effort Behind One of Classical Music's Greatest Hits

• Streetsblog Chicago – New Elevated Chicago / DePaul studies look at how vacant lots near transit impact quality of life on the South and West sides

• The Cut – Is a Sick Kid Better than an Absent Kid?

• LRB – What’s Good for India: Good for Tata

• Artforum – Circuit Bending: Ethiopian art at a crossroads

Thanks for reading, and for listening if you can make it on Monday!

1. I am incapable of mentioning this tune without also linking to my favorite version of it, from one of my favorite pieces. Biber really makes that “carol”-like character sing through.

2. Don’t take this as a complaint about Collard overall: he may be famous, but I think he’s a weirdly underrated pianist; listen to his Saint-Saëns or even his Schubert.

3. I should say that—maybe this has already become obvious to some of you—I’m equally a sucker for music that World Music Central promotes, although the writeups there are unfortunately pretty skimpy and often error-ridden.

4. Sure, maybe not all of that belongs as the official album title—although they seem to be pretty consistent—but how am I supposed to resist including it all?

5. “UhUh”—which, as RESCENE’s official debut, brings the count up to four in one week!—is better.